Week one of the reporting season saw nine companies beat expectations (CSL, RMD, TWE, JHG, AGL, IEL, MGC, NWS, MIN) and six companies miss (CBA, AMP, TAH, NVT, AQG, RIO).

The American President’s first comment on the 7% fall of US shares prices earlier this week, having taken credit almost daily over the past year for its rise, was a magnificent piece of Trumpery.

This is a significant negative for the banks, in my view. It will be expensive, distracting and unpredictable, and the recommendations and government response could end up being material, especially if we have a Labor Government by then (which seems likely).

During my interview yesterday with Andrew Thorburn, the CEO of NAB, he started talking about the coming competition from Google, Facebook and Amazon. He mentioned those three by name.

Here’s a fantastic chart from the strategists at Credit Suisse this week:

I had a coffee this week with a private equity investment manager, who was explaining that he never pays more than 4-6 times EBITDA (cash flow) for a business. And that’s pretty typical for those who actually buy businesses – you want a cash payback of no more than five years, or a very good reason for something longer (that is, “strategic reasons” – which is to say, you really want it).

Guess which sector of the Australian market has produced the best long-term performance. Banks? Resources? Think again. It’s health care.

Yesterday, Standard & Poors downgraded China’s debt from AA- to A+. So far, mass panic has not ensued.

I had three reminders this week about how important it is to diversify – to spread your investment risks.

I had dinner the other night with an endangered species: a fund manager who is overweight Aussie banks.

The other big event this week was America’s withdrawal yesterday from the Paris climate agreement.

There has been a lot of stuff written about Amazon this week because Monday was the 20th anniversary of its listing on Nasdaq, mostly focusing on the 63,990% increase in its share price over those 20 years.

This is a hard thing to say, and I don’t do it lightly, but we may be at the point where you’d be better off investing anywhere but Australia.

I recorded a long, fascinating interview this week with Richard Baldwin, professor of international economics at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, and author of new book called “The Great Convergence: information technology and the new globalisation”.